STrib: Not Just Lib, Lying Lib

"You lie!" is commonly heard as well-reasoned people read the editorial pages of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Not it appears to be the cry of advertisers reading the paper's circulation figures. From Ad Age, datelined today:

In the latest blowup over the accuracy of print publications' circulation figures, four advertisers have filed a lawsuit alleging that the Star Tribune newspaper of Minneapolis routinely overstated its paid circulation.

The lawsuit alleges the STrib:

• Required distributors to deliver unsold newspapers to residential and commercial addresses including hospitals, shopping centers and schools, whether school was in session or not.
  

• Made distributors dump unsold newspapers.

• Manipulated reports submitted to the Audit Bureau of Circulations.

• Continued to deliver newspapers to subscribers who had suspended delivery during vacations.

• Refused to credit retailers with unsold newspapers, reporting the papers as sold instead.

All are common, and illegal, ploys for boosting circulation. In an article in yesterday's paper, the STrib "forcefully denied" the claims.

The paper's owners, McClatchy, own three papers here in CA, including the influencial Sacramento Bee, and about a dozen other papers, so this could get intersting.